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REVIEWS  AND  BOOK  NOTICES. 

The  Elei^ies  of  Albius  Tibullus.  The  Corpus  Tibullianum,  edited 
with  Introduction  and  Notes  on  Books  i,  ii,  and  iv,  2-14,  by 
KiRBY  Flower  Smith,  Professor  of  Latin  in  The  Johns 
Hopkins  University.  New  York:  American  Book  Com- 
pany, 1913. 

'  Eine  Erneuerung  des  veralteten  Kommenlars  von  L.  Dissen 
(Gbtt.  1835)  ist  ein  Bediirfniss'.  These  words  of  Eduard  Nor- 
den  (Einl.  in  die  Alt.,  i,  1912,  p.  437)  are  a  concise  expression  of 
:\  want  long  felt.  Several  excellent  texts  of  Tibullus  exist,  selec- 
tions tor  use  in  schools  have  been  well  edited  by  such  scholars  as 
K.  P.  Schulze,  K.  Jacoby,  and  J.  P.  Postdate,  but  the  complete 
commentaries  of  Martinon  (1895)  and  N6methy  (1905)  were  half 
hearted  attempts  from  which  scholars  turned  back  with  relief  to 
Dissen.  Meantime  valuable  contributions  to  our  knowledge  of 
Tibullus  have  continued  to  accumulate  until  the  need  of  an  edition 
which  should  present  the  results  in  scholarly  form  has  become 
urgent.  Professor  Smith  has  answered  the  call.  At  last  we  have 
a  real  edition — aw  edition  which  supersedes  that  of  Dissen  and 
becomes  the  standard  interpretation  of  Tibullus. 

The  purpose  of  the  book  more  than  justifies  its  bulk.  At  first 
thought  an  introduction  of  93  pages  and  a  commentary  of  343 
pages  on  a  Latin  text  of  48  pages  se^rn  entirely  disproportionate. 
But  to  all  who  care  for  a  real  interpretation  of  Tibullus,  his  posi- 
tion in  the  history  of  elegy,  and  his  relation  to  ancient  and  mod- 
ern poetry.  Professor  Smith's  book  will  seem  none  too  large.  On 
the  contrary  the  reader  will  regret  the  loss  of  much  valuable  ma- 
terial when  he  learns  (p.  9)  that  the  volume  even  in  its  present 
generous  size  is  the  result  of  rigid  condensation  and  excision. 
A  nong  other  losses  are  a  full  apparatus  criticus  and  a  complete 
list  of  authorities. 

The  form  of  the  book  is  conditioned  by  the  requirements  of  a 
series  'edited  for  use  in  schools  and  colleges.'  but  since  alter  all 
Professor  Smith's  appeal  is  primarily  to  scholars  and  advanced 
students  the  world  over,  there  will  be  a  feeling  of  regret  that  the 
book  could  not  appear  in  a  form  more  in  harmony  with  its  char- 
acter— with  a  page  large  enough  to  admit  a  critical  apparatus 
and  notes  beneath  the  text. 

The  text,  which  includes  the  entire  Corpus  Tibullianum  with 
the  exception  of  the  two  Priapea,  is  based  on  that  of  Hiller's 
30 


462  AMERICAN  JOURNAL  OF  PHILOLOGY. 

edition,  Leipsic  (Tauchnitz),  1885.  Professor  Smith  makes  no 
claim  of  originality  for  his  text ;  he  has  collated  no  manuscripts 
(this  has  been  adequately  done  by  others),  and  he  makes  no 
conjectures.  Nevertheless  every  real  commentator  must  consti- 
tute his  own  text,  and  even  when  the  manuscript  materials  have 
been  supplied  by  others  the  task  requires  nice  judgment.  The 
choice  of  Miller's  text  (1885)  as  a  basis  was  wise.  It  is  conve- 
nient and  accessible,  it  contains  the  manuscript  readings,  and 
it  has  the  necessary  quality  of  sane  conservatism.  It  is  superior 
in  one  or  more  of  these  points  to  each  of  the  other  texts  which 
were  available:  Killer's  of  1893  in  the  Corpus  poetarum  latino- 
rum,  vol.  i,  Postgate's  in  the  Bibliotheca  Oxoniensis,  1905, 
Haupt-Vahlen's  sixth  edition,  1904  (the  seventh  published  by 
Helm,  1912,  appeared  too  late  for  Professor  Smith's  use),  and 
Cartault's,  Paris,  1909. 

The  process  of  condensation  to  which  Professor  Smith  has 
subjected  his  material  has  inevitably  produced  errors  and  inccn- 
sistencies  and  the  parts  concerned  with  the  manuscripts  and  the 
text  seem  to  have  suffered  especially.  I  record  these,  following 
in  general  the  order  in  which  they  occur.  The  remarks  on 
Textual  Tradition  (Introd.  §vi)  are  sometimes  misleading  and 
sometimes  inconsistent  with  the  Appendix.  Is  there  other  evi- 
dence than  Norden's  (Kunstpr.,'  p.  724)  that  in  all  likelihood  we 
owe  a  special  debt  of  gratitude  to  Hildebert,  t  1134.  for  the  pre- 
servation of  Tibullus  from  the  9th  to  the  i3tli  century?  Hilde- 
bert's  influence  is  possible,  not  'likely'.  He  was  'a  famous 
Latin  poet  and  teacher ',  a  great  admirer  of  the  classical  poets, 
and  his  elegiac  verse  is  remarkably  pure,  but  he  does  not  men- 
tion Tibullus,  and  the  purity  of  his  elegiacs  is  probably  due  to 
the  influence  of  Ovid,  which  was  incomparably  greater  in  the 
middle  ages  than  that  of  Tibullus.  At  p.  89  we  read  that  the 
Codex  Eboracensis  'is  occasionally  of  some  value',  but  that 
'  other  manuscrips  of  this  family  .  .  .  have  no  independent  value ', 
and  (p.  90)  '  the  exact  position  of  the  Guelferbytanus  in  our 
textual  tradition  is  not  altogether  certain  '.  This  seems  to  imply 
that  no  members  of  the  \|/-  group,  the  inferior  manuscripts,  except 
possibly  y  (cod.  Ebor. )  and  g  (Guelf.)  have  a  value  indepi-ndtnt 
of  A  and  V,  the  two  best  of  the  complete  manuscripts.  Such  a 
view  would  mean  that  no  excellent  reading  of  >//•  not  in  AV  is 
pure,  i.  e.  comes  from  the  archetype  by  a  route  different  from 
that  of  AV,  but  that  all  such  readings  are  due  to  conjectures  of 
the  Itali.  It  seems  to  me  unsafe  to  adopt  this  view  at  present. 
Excluding  agreements  with  Fr.  Par.  more  than  60  readings  of  i//^ 
are  accepted  by  Hiller  (1885),  Vahlen",  and  Postgate  (1905)  in 
the  first  book  (nearly  half  the  Corpus)  and  more  than  20  such 
readings  are  accepted  in  addition  by  one  or  more  of  these  editors. 
Thus  over  80  or,  if  we  substitute  Hiller  (1893)  for  his  text  of 
1885,  over  100  of  these  readings  are  either  right  or  worthy  of 
notice.     Now  it  is  just  possible  that  all  these  good  readings  may 


REVIEWS  AND  BOOK  NOTICES.  463 

be  conjectures,  but  it  is  far  more  likely  that  some  at  least 
are  derived  from  the  archetype  through  a  copy  or  cop\es  now 
lost.  So  too  the  account  of  the  Freisin^  and  Paris  Excerpts  (Fr. 
Par.)  is  misleadintj  because  it  has  been  condensed  into  one  para- 
i^raph  (p.  89).  All  the  statements  are  not  true  of  Fr.,  for  the 
two  collections  differ  in  important  details.  It  is  not  correct  to 
say  that  the  editors  oi  both  excerpts  'do  not  scruple  to  Bowdlerize'. 
I  can  find  no  certain  case  of  Bowdlerizing  in  Fr.;  on  the  contrary 
Bowdler  would  hardly  have  excerpted  III.  2,  1-2  : 

Qui  primus  caram  iuveni  carumque  puellae 
Eripuit  iuvenem  ferreus  ille  fuit, 
or  I.  2,  19. 

Ilia  docet  molli  furtim  derepere  lecto. 

It  is  true  that  Fr.  occasionally  cite  from  the  midst  of  an  erotic 
passage  without  representing  the  erotic  context  (I.  6,  33-34), 
but  the  same  conciseness  is  observed  where  no  erotic  content 
is  at  hand  (I.  i,  25,  etc.).  The  excerptor  of  Par.,  on  the  other 
hand,  actually  changes  erotic  allusions  to  a  form  not  offensive  to 
monkish  ears  (III.  3,  32  ;  II.  4,  29,  etc.).  Again  many  of  the  Fr. 
excerpts  are  single  words — which  is  not  true  of  Par. — so  that  it  is 
not  certain  that  all  of  Fr.  come  hoxx\  florile^ia.  Nor  is  it  by  any 
means  certain  that  Fr.  '  enjoyed  a  wide  popularity  from  the 
eleventh  to  the  fourteenth  century '.  The  dates  assigned  to  Fr. 
and  Par.  in  the  Introd.  (p.  89)  are  respectively  the  eleventh  and 
twelfth  (or  thirteenth)  centuries,  but  in  the  Appendix  (p.  527) 
the  tenth  and  eleventh  centuries.  The  former  statement  is  the 
one  usually  made  by  experts  who  have  inspected  them.' 

The  brief  statements  (p.  90)  about  editions  need  some  revision 
and  expansion.  I.  G.  Huschke's  ed.  of  1814  had  notes  on  only 
three  elegies  (I,  1,3  and  7).  Huschke's  complete  ed.  appeared 
in  Leipsic  in  1819.  Not  enough  credit  is  given  to  Baehrens 
(1876-1878).  His  'gieat  service  lay'  not  so  much,  I  should  say, 
'in  demonstrating  the  position  and  value  in  our  textual  tradition 
of  the  Ambrosianus'  as  in  virtually  discovering  the  two  mainstays 
of  the  text  (AV),  although  he  wrongly  set  g  above  them. 

One  cannot  help  regretting  that  Professor  Smith  did  not  retain 
in  some  torm  an  adnotatio  critica  containing  just  the  bare  manu- 
script variants.  As  it  is  we  find  in  the  Appendix  a  mere  record 
of  the  variations  from  Hiller's  text  (1885)  and  even  so  it  is  not 
always  clear  what  Hiller's  reading  is,  for  the  latter's  name  is 
omitted  from  many  of  the  readings  and  the  assumption  that  the 
second  reading  cited  in  each  record  is  Hiller's  does  not  work  out, 
since  at  1.7,49  two  readings  (centum  ludis  >/r  Smith;  centum 
ludos  A)  are  printed,  neither  of  which  is  Hiller's.     So  at  II.  3, 

^  Postsrate,  1905,  assigns  Fr.  to  the  loth,  and  Par.  to  the  nth,  and  Hiller 
1893,  both  to  the  eleventh. 


464  AMERICAN  JOURNAL  OF  PHILOLOGY. 

14c  and  III.  4,  26  Hiller's  reading  is  not  given  at  all,  and  at  IV. 
I,  I  Smith's  own  reading  is  not  printed.  Two  passages  are 
recorded  as  varying  from  Hiller  in  which  Prof.  Smith  agrees  with 
Hiller:  I.  10,  50  and  II.  3,  34,  where  both  mark  a  lacuna.  In 
two  others  the  Appendix  misleads  one  as  to  Hiller's  text:  I.  6, 
72,  where  Hiller  is  said  t-o  have  in  medias  propriasque,  but  actually 
has  i?i  medias  proripiarque,  and  II.  6,  45  where  Smith  omits 
vetat  Hiller.  There  is  no  record  of  the  fact  that  Smith  differs 
from  Hiller  in  the  line  numbering  of  the  Panegyric  from  v.  113 
(=Hiller  112^)  to  the  end.  Hiller's  final  judgment  on  the  text 
is  contained  in  his  edition  of  1893,  which  is  still  more  conservative 
than  that  of  1885.  It  is  significant  ot  Professor  Smith's  attitude 
toward  the  text  that  he  agrees  with  Hiller  in  ten  of  the  passages 
in  which  the  latter  in  1893  adhered  more  closely  to  the 
manuscripts. 

Professor  Smith's  choice  of  Hiller  as  a  guide  indicates  his  sym- 
pathy with  that  scholar's  attitude  toward  those  two  nuisances  of 
TibuUian  studies,  transposition  and  strophic  symmetry.  He 
makes  the  one  transposition  (iv,  4)  which  is  universally  admitted 
and  nowhere  discovers  couplets  arranged  in  'sevens'  or  '  nines' 
or  what  you  will,  whereas  in  some  of  the  most  recent  editions 
(Postgate's  'Selections',  1903,  and  Cartault's  text,  1909)  there 
are  survivals  of  the  time  honored  practice  of  transposition.  The 
ghost  of  Scaliger  has  been  hard  to  lay.  And  yet  the  logic  of 
the  transpositionists  has  had  one  good  effect :  it  has  forced  the 
defenders  of  the  manuscript  order  to  seek  arguments,  and  in  this 
way  they  have  attained  a  finer  understanding  of  the  development 
of  the  elegiac  mood. 

On  details  of  text  Professor  Smith's  judgment  is  jjenerally 
sound,  but  there  are,  of  course,  decisions  with  which  one  disa- 
grees. In  i,  3,  4,  for  example,  editors  have  always  been  divided 
between  Mors  modo  nigra  A  V  and  Mors  precor  atra  >//  Stnif/i, 
and  as  Cartault  is  tond  of  saying,  'La  decision  est  d61icate!' 
Undoubtedly  Mors  atra  is  the  regular  phrase,  but  exactly  for  that 
reason  its  presence  in  yj/-  creates  suspicion.  Niger  on  the  other 
hand,  though  not  applied  anywhere  to  Mors,  is  used  symbolically 
of  death  by  Lygdamus  iii,  3,  5,  a  passage  based  in  general  on 
this,  cf.  Hor.  Sat.  I.  9,  73.  I  should  not  venture  to  reject  the 
reading  of  AV — yet.  V.  17  aves  dant  omina  dira  A  V  Stnilh 
aves  aut  omina  dira  y\r  Hiller,  etc.  The  shift  from  the  direct  state- 
ment aves  dant,  etc.  (17)  to  the  indirect  Saturni  sacram  me  ten- 
uisse  diem  (18)  is  very  hard,  especially  in  TibuUus.  The  sup- 
port cited  (ii,  5,  71-78  and  several  passa>;es  from  Livy)  contains 
nothing  very  much  like  this  and  causor  seems  nowhere  in  Latin 
to  introduce  a  direct  statement  (Thes.  s.  v.).  It  seems  better  to 
follow  x//'  in  17  and  read  in  18  Saturnive  supporting  the  aut  .  .  aut 
.  .  -ve  by  examples  from  the  Thes.  s.  v.  V.  86  colo  A  V  Smith 
colu  Fr.  Hiller.  The  high  authority  of />.  and  the  fact  that  it  is 
Uctio  difficilior  commend  colu.     Tibulhis's  tendency  to  purism 


REVIEWS  AND  BOOK  NOTICES.  465 

can  hardly  override  this  argument.  I.  6,  7  ilia  quidem  tarn  multa 
negat  A  V  Sntilh.  But  no  parallels  lor  tain  multa  as  adverb 
(  =  '  So  many  times  as  she  is  asked  ')  are  cited.  I.  6,  72  immerito 
pronas  proripiarque  vias  Smith,  chiefly  aittr  \//  (A  is  corrupt). 
Probably  (cf.  Cart.iult)  proprias  A  has  crowded  out  some  word 
which  may  have  been  entirely  different  in  form.  Therefore  no 
form  of  proiuis  is  especially  probable.  Moreover  the  accusative 
with  proripi  is  unparalleled.  Rigler's  in  medias  .  .  vias  is  at  least 
better  syntax,  ii,  2,  22  hie  veniat  Natalis  avis  A  V  Smith.  No 
parallel  is  cited  lor  hie,  cf.  I,  3,  91.  There  are  good  notes  on  the 
textual  questions  raised  by  ii,  3,  34 ;  ii,  5,  79  (the  '  shifted '  pluper- 
fect which  renders  changes  unnecessary) ;  iv,  6,  15;  iv,  7,  i,  but 
none  at  all  on  ii,  5,  4  ;  ii,  5,  108  (where  ista  A  seems  perfectly  good 
against  lUa  y^  Smith);  iv,  2,  23 ;  iv,  4,  6;  iv,  6,  19,  and  some  other 
passages.  In  most  of  these  difficult  passages  the  best  solution 
has  been  adopted,  but  some  of  them  call  urgently  for  at  least  a 
brief  discussion,  e.  g.  ii,  5,  4;  iv,  4,  6 ;  iv,  6,  19,  in  all  of  which 
the  reading  o(  A  is  rejected.  In  iv,  8,  6  neu  tempestivae  saepe 
propinque  viae  A  Sviith  (Hiller  1893  and  Postgate  mark  as 
corrupt)  the  editor  admits  that  no  explanation  is  satisfactory.  He 
translates  'always  on  the  eve  of  some  untimely  journey'  which 
is  the  woman's  point  of  view  even  if  the  Latin  is  decidedly  what 
Gruppe  called  'weiblich',  neu  tempestivae  being  taken  in  the 
sense  of  intempestivae.  Moreover  no  acceptable  parallels  are 
cited  for  propinquus  with  the  genitive.  But  Professor  Smith 
seems  justified  in  leaving  the  passage  as  it  stands  and  trying  to 
interpret  it  instead  of  making  several  changes.  This  is  in  general 
his  attitude,  and  that  such  conservatism  is  sound  is  amply  proved 
by  the  history  of  textual  emendation. 

The  connected  presentation  of  those  topics  which  concern  the 
history  of  Tibullus  in  antiquity  and  during  the  middle  ages  is  to 
be  found  in  the  Introduction,  pp.  30-87,  but  these  pages  must  be 
supplemented  by  the  material  scattered  throughout  the  Notes. 
The  first  of  these  topics  is  the  '  Life  of  Tibullus  '  (§  ii).  Professor 
Smith  uses  for  his  reconstruction  the  vita  and  Horace's  two 
p:)ems  to  Albius — sources  which  have  been  rejected  without 
sufficient  reason  by  some  scholars — in  addition  to  the  other 
external  and  internal  evidence.  He  displays  admirable  care  in 
stating  nothing  as  a  fact  which  is  merely  a  more  or  less  probable 
inference  and  a  still  more  admirable  restiaint  in  refusing  to  make 
any  inferences  at  all  on  some  points  which  have  too  often  been 
taken  as  certainties.  He  says,  for  example,  that  the  date  of 
Tibullus's  death,  19  B.  C,  *is  the  nearest  approach  to  a  definite 
date  in  the  life  of  our  poet '.  He  refuses  to  assign  the  impover- 
ishment of  the  poet's  estate  (I.  i,  19-22)  to  any  definite  cause. 
He  frankly  admits  that  we  do  not  know  the  order  of  Messalla's 
expeditions  to  the  East  and  to  Gaul  and  thus  abandons  our  only 
hope  of  dating  accurately  I,  1,3,  and  7.  All  this  is  correct  and 
it  is  gratifying  to  have  it  stated  so  frankly.     He  expressly  com- 


466  AMERICAN  JOURNAL  OF  PHILOLOGY. 

bats  the  favorite  method  of  makinor  inferences  from  the  poet's 
silence — for  example,  that  Tibullus  and  the  circle  of  Messalla 
were  politically  opposed  to  the  circle  of  Maecenas.  The  sup- 
posed rivalry  indicated  by  Vergil's  ten  eclogues  and  Tibullus's 
ten  elegies  of  Book  i,  by  Horace's  Priapus  Satire  and  Tibullus's 
Priapus  elegy,  is  sufficiently  explained  by  '  the  common  phe- 
nomenon of  a  contemporary  interest  in  certain  themes  and  forms'. 
Very  interesting  too  is  the  suggestion  (p.  39)  that  Messalla,  who 
is  known  to  have  been  interested  in  niceties  of  style,  may  have 
had  far  greater  influence  on  Tibullus  than  we  know.  Against 
the  oft  tried  effort  to  write  a  history  of  Tibullus's  love  affairs 
Professor  Smith  says  (p.  43),  '  The  poet  is  free  to  interweave  fact 
with  fiction,  actual  events  with  mere  literary  motives ;  and  only 
those  who  are  in  the  secret  can  be  sure  which  is  which  ',  and  yet 
'  the  simple  faith  of  the  old  commentators  who  . .  took  every  refer- 
ence at  its  face  value,  is  not  more  unreasonable  than  the  sweep- 
ing incredulity  of  some  of  our  modern  critics' — this  last  a 
sensible  protest  against  those  who  would  make  of  the  poet's 
work  a  mere  cento  of  bookishness.  Of  the  Delia  elegies  the 
editor  says  that  although  there  is  no  chronological  sequence,  '  it 
is  significant  ot  the  poet's  art  that .  •  .  the  emotional  sequence, 
\\\^  psychological  d.^\^\o'^m.Q.\\\.^  and  its  effect  on  the  persons  con- 
cerned, are  at  once  complete  and  convincing  '.  To  disengage 
the  realities  from  these  artistic  presentments  of  the  poet's  moods 
is  indeed  '  peculiarly  difficult ',  and  one  of  these  realities  is  the 
character  of  the  poet.  To  Professor  Smith,  as  to  most  of  the 
poet's  readers,  '  he  rarely  fails  to  ring  true',  he  was  tender  and 
refined,  and  loved  the  simple  life  of  the  country,  but  when  we 
read  that  the  poet's  reference  (ii,  3)  to  his  '  tender  hands '  and 
'  slender  limbs  '  is  no  doubt  really  descriptive  of  his  personal 
appearance,  that  probably  his  vitality  '  was  low  and  his  constitu- 
tion delicate.  Otherwise  he  would  not  have  died  at  the  early 
age  of  35  ',  that  in  fine  '  Tibullus  was  a  hypochondriac  ',  we  feel 
that  even  Professor  Smith's  carefully  qualified  inferences  are 
going  a  bit  too  far.  All  this  rests  primarily  on  that  interpreta- 
tion of  Horace,  Epist.  i,  4  which  was  recently  elaborated  by 
Ullman  (A.  J.  P.  33,  1912),  and  although  Professor  Smith  appar- 
ently rejects  most  of  the  exact  agreements  which  UJlman  finds 
between  the  Tibullus  of  this  epistle  and  him  of  the  elegies,  he 
draws  from  it  nevertheless  the  inference  that  Tibullus  was  a 
hypochondriac.  Some  such  meaning  must  certainly  be  con- 
tained in  the  epistle,  but  even  so  we  cannot  date  it  accurately, 
we  know  that  hypochondriacs  are  often,  when  not  obsessed,  the 
gayest  of  men,  that  Tibullus  was  by  no  means  lacking  in  humor, 
and  that  he  had  been  vigorous  enough  to  endure  the  hardships 
of  at  least  one  campaign.  I  doubt  whether  we  reallv  know  any- 
thing about  the  poet's  'delicate  constitution',  or  whether  'the 
last  years  of  our  poet's  brief  life  were  perhaps  occasionally 
haunted  by  the  fear  that  he  was  destined  never  to  realize  his  one 


REVIEWS  AND  BOOK  NOTICES.  467 

consuming  aml)ition,  a  permanent  place  in  the  Roman  Temple 
of  Fame '•  It  is  a  cleverly  drawn  picture,  it  may  be  true,  but  it 
cannot  be  regarded  as  more  than  possible. 

The  third  section  of  the  Introduction  is  a  ^ood  sketch  of  the 
Later  Tradition  and  Imitation  of  Tibullus.  The  outline  of  his 
influence  on  European  literatures  is  entirely  new  and  provides  a 
good  basis  for  future  work  in  this  field.  Indeed  Professor 
Smith  has  done  an  enormous  amount  of  this  work  himself  and 
the  Notes  are  full  of  the  results  of  his  reading.  He  has  had  in 
addition  the  valuable  aid  of  his  colleague  Professor  Mustard, 
who  has  earned  a  name  as  a  specialist  in  this  department.  This 
feature  of  the  book  will  prove  of  value  not  only  to  classical 
scholars  but  also  to  workers  in  modern  literature.  It  is  note- 
worthy that  Tibullus,  like  many  another  poet,  has  had  his  periods 
of  eclipse.  In  the  si.xteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries,  for  ex- 
ample, little  attention  was  paid  to  him — there  was  no  '  Tudor 
translation ',  as  Professor  Smith  says.  Indeed  Miss  Palmer's 
'  List  of  English  Editions  and  Translations  of  Greek  and  Latin 
Classics  printed  before  164.1  '  shoe's  that  there  was  neither  edition 
nor  translation  as  late  as  1641. 

The  fact  that  the  influence  of  Tibullus  on  modern  literatures  has 
on  the  whole  been  'less  than  that  of  any  other  great  Roman 
poet'  is  Professor  Smith's  justification  for  comparing  Tibullus 
with  Propertius  and  Ovid  in  order  to  determine  those  qualities 
of  Tibullus  which  have  retarded  his  influence.  Such  com- 
parisons inevitably  lead  to  the  selection  of  certain  qualities  in 
one's  favorite  by  virtue  of  which  he  is  superior  to  the  others. 
Professor  Smith's  favorite  is  Tibullus,  but  he  disarms  criticism 
by  admitting  that  'comparisons  .  .  .  are  more  or  less  futile'  and 
'the  three  poets  are  complementary  rather  than  parallel'.  He 
does  not  forget  that  there  are  to-day,  as  there  were  in  Quin- 
tilian's  time,  those  qui  Propertium  vialhit.  Moreover  in  rehand- 
ling  this  timeworn  theme  he  has  not  only  accomplished  his 
immediate  object,  but  has  supplied  us  with  the  best  brief  critique 
of  Tibullus  in  English. 

Conservatism  marks  the  discussion  of  The  Corpus  TibuUianum 
(§  V).  Professor  Smith  would  like  to  identify  Lygdamus  with 
Ovid's  brother  (Doncieux's  theory),  but  thinks  that  the  famous 
natalem  primo  nostrum  videre  parentes,  etc.,  cannot  be  proved  to 
mean  the  first  anniversary  of  Lygdamus's  birth,  iv,  2-6 ; 
13-14,  are  assigned  to  Tibullus  and  the  stylistic  arguments 
against  this  are  rightly  characterized  as  of  no  value.  In  passing 
we  note  an  error  (p.  77)  :  Gruppe  was  the  first  to  note  that 
iv,  2-12  fall  into  two  groups,  but  he  connected  2-7,  not  2-6,  as 
Professor  Smith  has  it.  A  correct  statement  may  be  found  on 
p.  81. 

The  discussion  of  Sulpicia's  elegidia  is  written  with  unusual 
sympathy  and  insight.  Professor  Smith  compares  these  little 
poetic  love  notes  in  their  straightforward  simplicity  and  absolute 


468  AMERICAN  JOURNAL  OF  PHILOLOGY. 

lack  of  affectation  with  the  poems  of  Catullus.  He  is  rightly 
skeptical  about  the  '  weibliches  Latein'  of  which  Gruppe  and 
Baehrens  made  so  much  and  adds  that  '  inexperience  in  style  is 
not  distinctively  feminine',  but  his  citation  ot  Cicero's  olt  quoted 
praise  of  Laelia  for  speaking  Latin  like  that  of  Plautus  or  Naevius 
seems  to  me  beside  the  mark,  since  a  woman  who  spoke  pure 
Latin  might  not  be  able  to  write  clear  Latin  verse  and  whatever 
Sulpicia's  conversational  powers  may  have  been,  she  certainly 
cannot  write  clearly.     Cf.  Catull  xxii  for  a  masculme  parallel. 

The  last  section  (vii)  ol  the  Introduction  is  entitled  The  Poet's 
Art  and  contains  a  brief  treatment  of  some  topics  which  are  illus- 
trated more  in  detail  in  the  Notes.  There  is  first  an  admirable 
account  of  Tibullus's  method  of  developing  his  theme.  This  is 
followed  by  an  account  of  the  development  of  the  distich  at  Rome. 
Catullus  is  correctly  termed  '  the  beginner,  still  too  near  his 
Greeks',  but  is  it  correct  to  say  that  Propertius  'especially  in 
his  earlier  work  .  .  drops  back  almost  to  the  inexperience  of 
Catullus?'  Was  not  Propertius  consciously  attempting  to  carry 
further  those  principles  of  Catullus  which  would  have  given  the 
Romans  a  form  at  once  more  Greek  and  less  monotonous  than 
that  which  reached  its  perfection  in  Ovid?  I  for  one  regret  that 
Propertius  abandoned  this  attempt  and  went  over  to  the  Ovidian 
camp.  The  monotony  of  that  eternally  recurrent  dissyllabic 
ending  would  hardly  be  altered  even  if  we  could  '  pronounce  as 
Ovid  did'. 

Extreme  compression  was  necessary  in  the  first  section  of  the 
Introduction,  the  Development  of  Elegy,  and  there  are  a  good 
many  points  on  which  one  could  wish  for  more  light  and  espe- 
cially the  citation  of  more  evidence.  The  views  of  Crusius  (s.  v. 
Elegie,  Pauly-Wissowa),  to  which  the  reader  is  referred  'for  fur- 
ther details',  are  often  not  acceptable.  Professor  Smith  is  right 
in  declining  to  discuss  the  origin  of  elegy,  but  the  insertion  of 
one  or  two  typical  ancient  views  would  have  been  wise.  The 
emphasis  laid  on  the  subjective  character  of  Old  Greek  Elegy 
is  correct ;  it  was  both  objective  and  subjective.  But  do  we  know 
that  the  'Nanno'  of  Mimnermus  consisted  of  *  poems',  and  does 
any  certain  fragment  of  the  'Nanno'  have  a  clear  '  sentimental- 
erotic 'character?  There  is  almost  nothing  about  the  Attic  school 
or  about  Theognis,  and  yet  Solon  and  Theognis,  for  example, 
contain  things  which  are  of  decided  value  to  one  who  would  un- 
derstand Augustan  elegy — the  praise  of  abstracts,  the  satiric  note, 
the  mythological  irapabaynn  in  its  erotic  application.  The  '  Lyde  ' 
of  Antimachus  is  spoken  of  as  '  elegies  '  (p.  i6),  but  Plutarch's 

words  are  rr^v  i\(y(inv  Txjv  KaXovixfvijv  AvSt]!/. 

The  sketch  of  social  conditions  in  the  Alexandrian  Age  (pp. 
17-18)  follows  Crusius  too  closely.  Crusius  knows  too  much 
about  the  emancipation  of  women  at  that  period.  We  are  apt  to 
assume  this  from  Catullus  Ixvi  and  from  Augustan  elegy,  but 
Berenice  was  a  queen  and   the  Augustans  endowed  the  arnica 


REVIEWS  AND  BOOK  NOTICES.  469 

with  attributes  which  were  due  to  the  higher  position  of  wonitn 
at  Rome.  In  other  words  it  is  difficult  to  prove  that  the  '  femini- 
zation of  hfe,  literature,  and  art'  had  made  much  headway  at 
Alexandria.  It  is  in  fact  difficult  to  reconstruct  a  j^eneral  picture 
of  the  literary  and  intellectual  development  of  that  age,  cf.  Wend- 
land,  Hellenist. — rom.  Kultur,  p.  2.  Again  Professor  Smith  agrees 
with  Crusius  in  thinking  it  '  likely  .  .  that  the  poems  [of  Philetas]  to 
Bitiis  were  essentially  lyric  and  subjective  ',  and  refers  to  the  lines 
of  Hermesianax  in  Athenaios,  13,  598  F.  But  this  testimonium 
tells  us  nothing  definite  of  the  lyric  or  subjective  character  of  that 
poetry.  Professor  Smith  seems  inclined  to  agree  with  Pohk-nz 
that  Philetas  wrote  subjective-erotic  elegy  of  the  idyllic  variety 
much  like  that  of  Tibullus,  cf.  Pohlenz,  X-ipiTer  etc.,  191 1,  and 
Smith's  review  A.J.  P.  XXXIV,  208.  A  careful  study  of  Poh- 
lenz's  article  has  convinced  me  that  on  this  point  his  conclusions 
cannot  be  regarded  as  more  than  possible.  Likewise  P.  Troll's 
interesting  and  valuable  dissertation,  De  elegiae  Romanae  origine 
(191 1),  an  attempt  to  show  by  analyzing  methods  of  composition 
that  there  must  have  been  Alexandrian  elegies  like  the  Roman 
type,  has  failed  to  prove  its  main  point,  although  it  throws  much 
light  on  the  structure  of  elegy  and  epigram.  We  are  in  fact  at 
present  not  able  to  approximate  a  trustworthy  view  of  the  origin 
of  the  subjective-erotic  type  of  elegy.  Much  more  work,  like 
that  of  Pohlenz  and  Troll,  on  the  numerous  elements  which  enter 
into  the  problem  is  needed  before  we  can  hope  for  substantial 
agreement. 

The  Notes — and  the  reader  must  bear  the  Introduction  con- 
stantly in  mind — prove  that  Professor  Smith  has  the  highest  ideal 
of  a  commentator's  duty.  He  aims  not  merely  to  determine  the 
characteristics  of  Tibullus  himself,  but  to  place  these  character- 
istics in  the  proper  perspective.  This  involves  a  comparative 
study  of  Greek  and  Roman  elegy  and  the  related  literature  of 
antiquity,  and  many  excursions  into  modern  literature  as  well. 
All  the  features  of  Tibullian  thought  and  style  and  metre  are 
Irichy  paralleled.  In  the  mass  of  this  material  there  is  very  little 
thatis  superfluous,  for  Professor  Smith  never  forgets  that  he  is 
interpreting  Tibullus,  and  yet  his  method  is  so  broad  that  the 
commentary  is  a  sort  of  handbook  of  Roman  poetics  so  far  as  the 
general  nature  of  Roman  poetry  may  be  illustrated  from  Tibullus 
and  the  elegy.  Anybody  who  has  attempted  an  adequate  inter- 
pretation of  a  single  Latin  poem  will  perceive  at  once  what 
enormous  toil  has  been  required  to  produce  this  commentary 
and  all  who  have  attempted  such  an  interpretation  of  Tibullus 
will  appreciate  the  fine  taste  and  excellent  judgment  with  which 
the  work  has  been  performed.  Every  statement  has  been  care- 
fully considered  and  the  omissions  are  hardly  less  significant. 
Indeed  the  excellence  of  a  commentary  based,  as  in  this  case, 
upon  the  accumulated  labors  of  centuries  is  determined  almost  as 
much  by  what  is  omitted  as  by  what  is  included. 


470 


AMERICAN  JOURNAL  OF  PHILOLOGY. 


It  is  not  accident  that  the  first  elegy  has  been  the  chief  centre 
of  controversy  concerning'  the  poet's  art.  It  is  one  of  his  most 
characteristic  poems.  Whoever  interprets  it  correctly  can  be 
trusted  with  the  other  elegies — and  a  scrutiny  of  some  crucial 
points  proves  that  Professor  Smith  can  be  trusted.  He  does  not 
know,  for  example,  the  exact  date  of  the  elegy,  the  special  occa- 
sion which  impelled  the  poet  to  write  it,  nor  the  exact  cause  of 
the  poet's  impoverishment  (vv.  19-22) — prominent  examples  of 
good  judgment  by  way  of  omission.  An  understanding  of  the 
development  of  the  thought  is  absolutely  essential  to  an  appreci- 
ation of  Tibullian  art.  There  is  an  admirable  discussion  of  this 
question  (Introd.,  pp.  93  AT-),  together  with  a  better  arrangement 
of  i,  I  than  has  hitherto  been  given — even  by  Vahlen.  The 
break  after  v.  52  seems  to  me  exactly  right.  The  note  on  v.  3 
contains  a  good  discussion  of  those  puzzling  plurals  about  which 
editions  of  Latin  and  Greek  poets  contain  so  many  wild  state- 
ments. Similar  notes  may  be  found  at  v.  23  (on  anaphora),  v.  29 
(the  '  aoristic'  infinitive),  v.  33  (-que  .  .  -que),  v.  38  (the  dissyl- 
labic close  of  the  pentameter — a  condensed  statement  of  the  facts 
in  Latin  poetry),  v.  40  (postponed  -que),  v.  54  (homoeoteleuton 
and  rhyme).  These  are  not  mere  local  phenomena  and  each  is 
treated  from  the  broader  point  of  view.  The  same  method  is 
maintained  throughout  the  notes.  The  characteristic  motives  of 
elegy  are  exceptionally  well  handled  :  witchcraft  (i,  2  ;  i,  5,  49  ff.), 
the  golden  age  (i,  3.  35  ff.),  lover's  oaths  (i,  4,  21  ;  i,  5,  35),  the 
sick  arnica  (1,  5,  9-18),  the  rich  lover  {ibid.  47-48),  etc.,  etc. 
No  other  edition  contains  so  many  adequate  notes.  There  are 
of  course  many  statements  about  whose  validity  opinions  will 
differ  since  the  questions  concerned  are  not  yet  solved,  but  errors 
of  fact  are  very  rare — for  example,  the  statement  accepted  (i.  i, 
35)  that  que  .  .  et  never  occurs  in  Cicero  (cf.  Att.  4,  i,  5)  and 
the  misleading  note  on  i,  7,  2  concerning  diaeresis  of  soliio  (cf. 
i,  10,  62). 

The  foregoing  gives  but  a  hint  of  the  richness  of  this  commen- 
tary. Professor  Smith  has  laid  a  very  solid  foundation  on  which 
to  build  in  the  future.  All  who  use  the  book  will  realize  that 
such  blemishes  as  it  may  have  are  exceedingly  insignificant  in 
comparison  with  its  great  merits.  It  is  immensely  superior  to 
any  other  edition  of  Tibullus,  and  it  will  live  because  it  possesses 
in  so  high  a  degree  those  qualities  which  are  essential  to  an 
edition  of^the  best  type. 

Arthur  Leslie  Wheeler. 

Bkyn  Mawr  College. 


U  C  (H  H- 


CDSEfiE3SSD 


■,4--^'  "■'■ 


